GENDER DISCRIMINATION WAS ON TRIAL

Background

From filing the complaint in 2004, through the trial and settlement in 2010, newsPRos was in on the ground floor to manage media relations for the nation’s largest employment discrimination class action lawsuit ever to go to trial. Our client, a national civil rights litigation firm, represented a class of U.S. female sales representatives at one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies. Six years after the initial filing, the case ended with the jury awarding hundreds of millions of dollars in compensatory and punitive damages. Weeks after the verdict, the case settled.

Challenge

For the plaintiffs and newsPRos’ client, the case was not only about obtaining justice and compensation for the wrongs committed; it was also about effecting systemic change at the pharmaceutical giant and setting an example for the industry.

Strategy

newsPRos determined that a coordinated, well-timed dissemination of trial-related information, including the testimony of key witnesses would generate media coverage and shine a spotlight on the pharmaceutical giant’s discriminatory practices, as well as humanize the women impacted by the ongoing and pervasive discriminatory practices at the company.

From the media generated by filing the complaint, which helped the firm identify additional class representatives and obtain significant additional evidence, during the many years of preparing and taking the case to trial, to the verdict and settlement, newsPRos managed all media relations for the case. The newsPRos team interacted with attorneys on media strategy to insure consistency with the legal strategy, prepared witnesses for media interviews, protected others from media coverage and maintained relationships with reporters and bloggers in the US and Europe throughout the six-year case and the intense three months of trial and settlement.

newsPRos was able to generate and maximize news coverage favorable to the plaintiffs’ case during trial using nightly advance emails previewing the next day’s trial activity, furnishing trial transcripts of the current day’s proceedings, keeping reporters informed of the court’s schedule and key witnesses’ appearances, as well as providing the media with opening and closing statements and verdict information in real time.

Results

Coverage of the trial and the verdict was pervasive and international in scope, including articles online and in print editions of major mainstream dailies and stories on every major U.S. network nightly newscast following the verdict, in addition to thousands of reports in business, legal, pharmaceutical and employment media, online and in print.

The lead attorneys were named “Litigators of the Week” by American Lawyer Media, a leading employment defense attorney was quoted in the Wall Street Journal calling the case a “game-changer;” and the firm secured recognition as one of the five top employment practices of 2010 from a major legal website, the only plaintiffs’ firm to appear on the list. In addition, the case was named the top employment case of 2010 by several private studies and media sources and it continues to garner media mentions daily in articles related to discrimination in the workplace.